Dec. 4th, 2016

armadillo1976 asks: Dec 4. From the perspective of a parent of a big(ish) kid, what do you remember most/best from the time your kid was 1-2? (Asking as a mom of a 1.5 year old, terrified that she is going to forget all the love and beauty and mess of these times...)

... yeah, I wish I had kept a journal, because my memories of that time are so sparse. And the photos are all prints, so they don't just come up when I'm scrolling through my phone.

I remember that the second Christmas, my brother-in-law sent the kidlet some electronic toy, and the kidlet touched it, and it sprang to life with a musical chord and a cartoonish voice saying, "Hi, there!", and the kidlet very firmly pushed it away and said, "Too noising."

I remember being up until the middle of the night putting the damned kitchen set together -- it was a gift from my parents, and I had assumed that it arrived all assembled (poor innocent that I was), so it hadn't occurred to me to open it up in advance. But I remember that kitchen set so fondly, and all the imaginary meals cooked on it, and all the conversations with "Mrs. Moldiwarp" had on the attached phone.

Mom remembers the kidlet climbing up to the back of the big chair (the one I'm sitting in now) with the Little Golden Book of Christmas Carols, singing some random words, climbing down, and saying, "Sing Si' Night book self!"

An older friend of mine used to tell me, "The hours are long but the years are short," and that is so true.